Look behind you, Dave: UKIP’s coming!

The recent outbreak of local elections has seen much self-congratulation by Labour for dishing the Tories which puts them roughly back where they were before they got donnered last time around (leaving aside Bradford where they had their noses rubbed in it by the Islamic ‘Respect’ Party, and the irrepressible Boffo Johnson retaining the Mayoralty of London).

But the commentators seem to missing the true significance.

The real winner was UKIP which got 13% of the vote. It is well on the way to replacing Lib Dems as the third force in English politics.

This is all bad news for the Conservative Party. UKIP voters tend to be disillusioned Tories.

There will be EU elections in 2014. Last time UKIP came in 2nd with 16.5% of the vote. Next time they may well do much better as the EU moves up the agenda of concerns for the electorate. This could provide the momentum for the General Election the following year.

Europe is not going off the front page any time soon. 2014 will be a momentous year.

In 2 years time we shall still be feeling the aftermath of the Euro crisis, and further IMF contributions at the expense of the UK taxpayer.

This the last opportunity for the UK to decide whether to irrevocably opt in to EU jurisdiction over 130 police and justice measures (including the awful EWA). And after the debacles over the deportation of terrorists, I can envisage the electorate going completely ape if a British government agrees to even more judicial power going to Brussels.

There will be a Commons vote on ratifying the EU 7-year budget framework, probably entailing a rise but at best freeze, which, at a time of possible tax hikes in the UK, will be about as welcome as a condom salesman in a nunnery.

The EU will implement a provision in the Lisbon Treaty which will enable the Eurozone (assuming it still exists) to gang-up on the UK to pass financial regulations that could have serious implications for our financial services industry.

All this is good news for UKIP and bad news for the Tories who may well see their share of the vote haemorrhaging away as disaffected Tory voters change allegiance or merely sit on their hands.

The Tories in particular have always played down EU affairs in their election campaigns for fear of reopening old ’Maastricht’ wounds. Now Europe is a serious headline issue amongst voters. The People’s Pledge, a pressure group campaigning for a referendum on the UK’s continuing membership of the EU, recently held a referendum in one English parliamentary constituency. There was a turn-out of 13,000 and an 89% vote in favour of a referendum. Even Vince Cable, Europhile and star of the Lib Dems, has launched a fierce attack on the Brussels bureaucracy and called for a more limited Europe. The tectonic plates are shifting, to use a right-on cliché.

So what is Dave to do?

Well, for starters he can spell out clear policies on the return of powers, a more flexible EU, remaining outside the Euro, exercising the block opt-out on police and justice matters, shrinking the EU budget especially the CAP. And not gold-plating the EU regulations that are implemented, and, indeed, simply ignoring those that are detrimental to British interests.

And then he might consider ditching some of his more crack-pot notions that have no resonance with the voters.

Who gives a flying fig for House of Lords reform except for a few deranged Libdems? It does a pretty good job as it is in protecting us from elective dictatorship of the Commons. Leaving aside the tired old has-beens elevated to the Lords after being life-long under-achievers in the Commons, it is a repository of a vast array of talent, experience and expertise amongst those of their Lordships who would scorn the idea of campaigning for election. I once had to appear before the Lords Committee on Science. Amongst the committee membership were such luminaries a s Lord Ritchie-Calder, one of the most distinguished scientists of the20th century.

What mandate does he have for wasting Parliamentary time and taxpayers’ money on homosexual ‘marriages’ ?

And how about keeping a few promises, like the reform of the defamation laws that make the English courts a magnet for American libel-tourists and throttle free speech. As with ‘super-injunctions that allow wealthy celebs to conceal their misdoings behind an injunction wherein the media is forbidden even to report that an injunction has been granted.

He might also wake up to the fact that increasing foreign aid by 37% at the same time as abolishing the names of famous old regiments and making 20,000 soldiers redundant does not sit too well with his natural constituency